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Sunday, April 17, 2016

Tesla coil causes carbon nanotubes to self-assemble into long wire

This is a cool must watch video on self assembly of carbon nano tubes into long wires from researchers at Rice University. HOUSTON – (April 14, 2016) – Scientists at Rice University have discovered that the strong force field emitted by a Tesla coil causes carbon nanotubes to self-assemble into long wires, a phenomenon they call “Teslaphoresis.”

This paper introduces Teslaphoresis, the directed motion and
self-assembly of matter by a Tesla coil, and studies this electrokinetic
phenomenon using single-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs). Conventional
directed self-assembly of matter using electric fields has been
restricted to small scale structures, but with Teslaphoresis, we exceed
this limitation by using the Tesla coil’s antenna to create a gradient
high-voltage force field that projects into free space. CNTs placed
within the Teslaphoretic (TEP) field polarize and self-assemble into
wires that span from the nanoscale to the macroscale, the longest thus
far being 15 cm. We show that the TEP field not only directs the
self-assembly of long nanotube wires at remote distances (>30 cm) but
can also wirelessly power nanotube-based LED circuits. Furthermore,
individualized CNTs self-organize to form long parallel arrays with high
fidelity alignment to the TEP field. Thus, Teslaphoresis is effective
for directed self-assembly from the bottom-up to the macroscale.